I thought the point of these flags was just to show your location because that can help when it's relevant to a thread. The idea was to identify you so that it becomes more obvious to those who respond to your posts that you for example are not in the USA.

I am really uncomfortable with the religious etc flags. It somehow goes against how we view religion on this board - we don't discuss it unless it is totally relevant to a thread.

I remember discussion about religious signature lines before and I don't see how this is any different?

I'm with you. This is really getting out of hand. I don't need to know, nor do I WANT to know everybody's religious background. It's immaterial. I don't need to know your sexuality or favorite charities or the fact that you think squirrels invented badmiton. It started out as a helpful tool and now it's become some beacon of self-portrayel that just makes the location issue even MORE confusing than it was before. Because now I have to decide if those 5 flags represent natinality, location, just some country that you love, religion or sexuality and what order they all go in.

I have to agree. The original idea was just to know where someone physically is so that we don't have to verify each time we're about to talk to someone whether we have to approach an issue from a British perspective or an American one, etc.

I'm fine with if we choose to NOT do religious flags, in fact, it's what I prefer. But if we decide do make them available, then we need to make many options available.

Logged

I am grateful for the friends I have made on EHell and everything I have learned, but it is time I move on.

I agree--a lot of people don't know every state flag (at least I don't) so please use the easily recognized USA flag plus your state flag if you must include it. I am a native born Texan living in Maryland. Should I have three flags? That is unnecessary!

I thought the point of these flags was just to show your location because that can help when it's relevant to a thread. The idea was to identify you so that it becomes more obvious to those who respond to your posts that you for example are not in the USA.

I am really uncomfortable with the religious etc flags. It somehow goes against how we view religion on this board - we don't discuss it unless it is totally relevant to a thread.

I remember discussion about religious signature lines before and I don't see how this is any different?

I'm with you. This is really getting out of hand. I don't need to know, nor do I WANT to know everybody's religious background. It's immaterial. I don't need to know your sexuality or favorite charities or the fact that you think squirrels invented badmiton. It started out as a helpful tool and now it's become some beacon of self-portrayel that just makes the location issue even MORE confusing than it was before. Because now I have to decide if those 5 flags represent natinality, location, just some country that you love, religion or sexuality and what order they all go in.

I have to agree. The original idea was just to know where someone physically is so that we don't have to verify each time we're about to talk to someone whether we have to approach an issue from a British perspective or an American one, etc.

I'm fine with if we choose to NOT do religious flags, in fact, it's what I prefer. But if we decide do make them available, then we need to make many options available.

If we can have flags that display pride in sexuality, why not ones that show pride in our religion?

I'm fine with only country flags but I think if we move into territory where we display flags for other things, we have to make room for all things. Can of worms.

If we can have flags that display pride in sexuality, why not ones that show pride in our religion?

I'm fine with only country flags but I think if we move into territory where we display flags for other things, we have to make room for all things. Can of worms.

They're all uneccessary. I just think it's ridiculous that this STARTED as an easy way to clarify location and has now morphed into this overly complicated pride stuff that makes it even HARDER to figure out where you're from. Why couldn't we have stuck to ONE flag that shows ONLY the country in which you reside? Why can't people find some other area in their signature to pull out all the things they're proud of? And why do people feel the need to flaunt their religion and sexuality on an etiquette forum that has pretty openly said that sex and religion are not generally topics of discussion anyway?

I'm not averse to people using flags to indicate more than their country of origin, but I agree that it leads to confusion, especially when it comes to unfamiliar flags - I can be pretty sure that Ms Cellany doesn't live in Rainbowland, but I couldn't tell a Missouri flag from an Illinois flag from an Estonian flag from a Lithuanian Refrigerator Worship flag. There must be a way to balance the two. Maybe an agreement that a poster will either define their flag (as some have been doing), or maybe to always keep the country to the far right or top of the flags, or something. The extra flags are fun, but they do sort of defeat the purpose.

Yeah, I don't want to see all the flags have to go away, because I think they're all really cool, but I do like the idea of having one designated "locator" flag where Ticia put it, and the others elsewhere.

Thanks, Ticia! This seems like a lot of work, and I appreciate you doing it.

Logged

"A child of five could understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five." - Groucho Marx

I'm not averse to people using flags to indicate more than their country of origin, but I agree that it leads to confusion, especially when it comes to unfamiliar flags - I can be pretty sure that Ms Cellany doesn't live in Rainbowland, but I couldn't tell a Missouri flag from an Illinois flag from an Estonian flag from a Lithuanian Refrigerator Worship flag. There must be a way to balance the two. Maybe an agreement that a poster will either define their flag (as some have been doing), or maybe to always keep the country to the far right or top of the flags, or something. The extra flags are fun, but they do sort of defeat the purpose.

I've already said that I don't have a problem with people identifying with a little tiny flag down at the bottom of a post. It's a teeny tiny flag. It's not starting a Big Major Discussion of who is Christian and who is gay and who is in the Armed Forces. It's identifying information if anyone cares to look at it, but it's not like people are waving big signs saying "Look at me! I'm a Kiwi living in Zimbabwe, but I love Ghana, too!"

I think that some of you are taking this way too seriously.

For the people who had flags I haven't gotten to yet: Sorry, I've been busy all day and hardly able to sit down for 5 minutes to myself. But I'll get to them tomorrow!

I've tried to adjust my flags in a way that would alleviate the confusion/irritation, some were experiencing. I hope it helped.

Hi Scuba_Dog. Maybe I'm just an ignorant American but I have no idea what those flags are for and the tininess isn't helping. I guess the best I can do is say, "Well, I know she/he isn't from the USA" which is useful information in and of itself, I suppose...

I'm guessing most people in the world would recognize a USA flag but asking us USAians to recognize the flags of other countries is just asking too much! (I kid, I kid!)